A Good Business Model – Forbes Coaches Council

A few coaches who are interested in becoming a Forbes coaches council member have reached out to me wanting to know my experience. I thought sharing my experiences here might be valuable to other coaches who have the same inquiries.

My experience:

Forbes reached out to me a bit over a year ago about joining the Forbes coaches council. The cost was $1200 per year. As an analytical person, I start to weigh the $100 expense per month with the value I would receive for joining, and I ultimately signed up after an initial interview. The two most appealing components of the offer were: 1.) The opportunity to publish on Forbes website, and 2.) A 10-hour personal assistant service per month.

I published 5 articles on Forbes last year and I appreciated the professionalism of my editors, as well as the readership on Forbes. Publishing on Forbes seemed easier than I expected. However, the editing time started to stretch longer than a month, likely due to the influx of coaches writing for Forbes.

I had to fire my first personal assistant because she didn’t do the work that she was committed to do. The 2nd assistant worked out better but her level of effort was still inconsistent. Forbes outsourced the personal assistance service to an offshore agency located in South America at the time.

What worked well?

Forbes is wise for creating this business model. In this fast-paced world, no journal publisher can compete well without user content. User content means having people other than your employees contributing to content. Forbes helps professional coaches publish content by providing an editing service and other support structures, enabling an inexpensive way to provide fresh content.

Coaches who love to write appreciate the opportunity to publish in this reputable journal. Contributing our knowledge and making an impact are fulfilling experience. Receiving readership also means strengthened online presence, advertisement for our expertise, and target market engagement.

At the same time, this business model is also easy to be duplicated. I expect to see more similar offers from various publishing companies.

Is the Forbes Coaches Council for me?

Coaches, in deciding to join the Forbes Coaches Council, you want to ask yourselves the following questions: 1) What is my intention for joining (obtaining readership, resources to edit articles, or personal branding?) and 2) Is Forbes is a good vehicle for me to align my actions with my intention? I trust you would know the answers when you are clear about your intention.